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Over the past month Cathay Pacific’s route planners have been busier than I ever remember them being. At the end of August the airline announced 3 new routes between Hong Kong and Europe and then, 3 weeks later, Cathay suspended its route to Düsseldorf. Now the route planners are at it again with the announcement of more service between Hong Kong and Europe and an increase in service to Israel too.
Cathay Adds To Its Barcelona Route
Cathay Pacific has historically run a summer seasonal service between Hong Kong and Barcelona but, in an announcement earlier today, the airline confirmed that the route will now operate year-round.
The route is currently coming to the end of it’s summer 2017 run and will end on 27/28 October but, when it returns on 15 April 2018 it will be here to stay.
From 15 April 2018 Cathay Pacific will operate the Hong Kong – Barcelona route with its A350-900 aircraft on the following schedule:
CX321 HKG 00:20 – 07:35 BCN A350 (Wed, Fri, Sun)
CX318 BCN 13:20 – 07:20+1 day HKG A350 (Wed, Fri, Sun)
Initially, as you can see from the schedule above, the route will be operated 3x/week but, from 1 July 2018, Cathay will add a fourth flight on Mondays.
The year-round service to Barcelona will complement Cathay’s existing year round service to Madrid which is set to become a 5x/week service from 29 October 2017 (it currently runs 4x/week).
Tel Aviv To Get Daily Service From Hong Kong
Cathay Pacific only launched its year-round service to Tel Aviv in March this year but the demand the airline has already seen for the route has now prompted it to increase its frequencies in 2018.
From 25 March 2018 the Hong Kong – Tel Aviv route will go from offering 4 flights per week to 6 and a 7th flight is expected to be added towards the end of 2018.
This is another of Cathay’s Airbus A350 routes and thew schedule from March 2018 looks like this:
CX675 HKG 01:00 – 07:40 TLV A350 (Mon – Sat)
CX676 TLV 13:50 – 05:10+1 day HKG A350 (Mon – Sat)
Cathay Pacific A350 – What You Need To Know
- There is no First Class cabin on the Cathay Pacific A350
- The Business Class seat on Cathay’s A350 is a refresh of an older version of the reverse herringbone seat the airline is known for.
- The A350 features Cathay Pacific’s new Premium Economy product that now gives all seats the comfortable leg rest that only bulkhead seats got before:
- The Premium Economy seats on the A350 come with 2″ of more seat pitch (leg room) and almost an inch more width compared to the A330-300 it has replaced on a lot of routes.
- The A350 comes equipped with Cathay’s latest over-water Internet technology giving connectivity for most of their journey.
- The humidity in the A350 can be controlled like in no other aircraft and that can have a significant positive effect on comfort and on how rested passengers are at their destination.
- The A350 has an advance air conditioning system which allows for varying temperature zones in the aircraft and filters the air in the cabin every 2 to 3 minutes.
You can find my review of the Cathay Pacific Airbus A350 Business Class cabin here.
Thoughts
While I’m not sure that Cathay’s Business Class is as great as it once was it’s still considerably better than a lot of the offerings you’ll find between Europe and Asia.
On top of this it’s not all that difficult to find Business Class or Premium Economy awards on Cathay Pacific for flights to/from Europe so, if you have the Asia miles/AAdvantage Miles/Avios or if you’ve made the most of Alaska Airline’s good mileage sales, you should find it even easier now to fly to/from Hong Kong in comfort.
Featured image: Kristian Sagia via Flickr
